Petition for Enforcement of Burial Ban at Old City Wall

Chairman Aryeh King of the Fund for the Preservation of National Lands filed a petition in the Supreme Court, Thursday, demanding that the state enforce a ban on burials in the national park site.at the southeast corner of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. The petition came after King got tired of getting no significant response from writing to local authorities.

He says that despite the archaeological and historical importance of the site, Commander Niso Shacham of the Old City police station gave Arabs permission to bury their dead there for the first time. The state confirmed the area as off limits to burials due to its national park status in 2007 and the following year the Nature and Natural Parks Authority announced that they would develop the site. The burials have continued and the site has not been developed and the petition seeks to find out why.